SHANGHAI – This hazy Tuesday afternoon in the country's financial capital, in a jampacked room at the plush Sheraton Hotel in Pudong district filled with over-eager Chinese media, Filipino boxing hero and the world's acclaimed boxing superstar Manny Pacquiao came to town to promote his fight with undefeated American Chris Algieri in a welterweight world title bout scheduled on Nov. 23 in China's gambling mecca, Macau.

China has come a long way from banning boxing for several decades to what now appears to be a full blown promotion of the sweet science in a country that has close affinity with martial arts. A steady stream of boxing shows had been held in the mainland and many more are being calendared in the future. Tuesday night's show at the Mercedez Benz Arena here headlined by undefeated rising star Ik Yang from Da Lian to coincide with the Pacquiao visit is one such event.

China's CCTV has a full-on boxing show every Sunday featuring some of the best and latest fights in boxing. Recently, Shanghai-based SECA has initiated a regular boxing TV show hosted by Ying Ying, the wife of China's two-time Olympic boxing gold medalist Zou Shiming.

In April last year, Bob Arum's Top Rank has embarked on a ground-breaking first boxing event at The Venetian Hotel & Casino in Macau. Six events later in July this year, Macau has firmly established itself as one of the boxing capitals in the world.

It looks like boxing's renaissance in the world's most popolous country could not be stopped and its popularity would signal a new breed of Chinese athletes launch their careers in one of the world's oldest sports. Would they be able to dominate the professional boxing scene in the coming years? Highly likely. As in other sports fields – atheltics, swimming, chess, basketball, and others – the world should expect the Zou Simings, the Ik Yangs and the Rex Tsos to headline boxing events all over the world. – With a report from Dong Secuya.